Georgia Natural Wonder #278 - Monroe Gardens - Fulton County (Part 7)

[Top Row Dawg]

We've chased William Lott Monroe around on the last two Georgia Natural Wonders in Atlanta. In this post we are traveling to his house and Company Gardens for today's Georgia Natural Wonder. In 1925 landscape architect William Lott Monroe bought 15 acres on North Boulevard at Rock Springs Road and built a home with trees he felled himself and sawed on the property. He also established and operated a landscape design business and a popular nursery called Monroe Gardens for many years. 

  
Today the tall stone fireplace from a lodge Monroe had built for public gatherings and two small stone structures (one actually a bomb shelter from the 1950s) which resemble English garden follies now make up the grounds of the Ansley-Monroe Villas condominiums that now occupy the site. 

Our TRD Scrolling Nugget about Monroe Gardens is Elton John's tribute to Marilyn Monroe. 



 
These are the Internet images. 



A large house on the southeast corner of Monroe Drive and Rock Springs Road, was built by Monroe at 1945 Monroe Drive for his daughter, and is still standing but has been converted into rental apartments. In 1937 North Boulevard was renamed Monroe Drive honoring William L. Monroe, Sr., founder of Monroe’s Landscape and Nursery Company and Monroe Gardens and his many landscape projects throughout the city. This is explained better in this walking tour of Piedmont Heights neighborhood.

TRD Visit To Monroe Gardens

 
I walked down to the Wedding Chapel behind the Ansley-Monroe Villas condominiums.

Monroe Gardens had beautiful gardens as well a nursery, where he grew plants for his landscaping clients. 

    
These are all TRD images from his visit to Monroe Gardens. 

He designed and installed over 10,000 gardens—private, commercial, and public—throughout Atlanta and the Southeast. 

  

His clients included Emory University, the Coca-Cola headquarters, Chastain Park (originally named North Fulton Park), and many more. 

  
Can see the rock walls in valley below the Ansley-Monroe Villas condominiums.

Monroe’s grounds were a popular wedding venue and social hangout with a fishing pond, waterfall, wishing well, picnic areas, an outdoor bar, and more. 

  

Now days, you can find relics of an outdoor chapel, bomb shelter, and outdoor fireplace among the Ansley-Monroe Villas town homes property. I visited these gardens yesterday. 

 

In 1928 the City of Atlanta began annexing Piedmont Heights by taking in the lots along North Boulevard. In the 1930s a new home could be bought for $4,700 on North Boulevard or Wimbledon Road. 

  

William Lott Monroe, Sr. (1891-1965), landscape designer and nurseryman, is recognized in newspaper articles as the “landscape artist” during the development of North Fulton Park (later renamed Chastain Memorial Park) in the late 1930s and early 1940s. This work was financed partially through WPA (Works Progress Administration) funds and supported with local prison labor. There are three main areas in Chastain Park with Monroe’s signature style as a landscape designer: (1) the master grill area; (2) the picnic grounds area; and (3) the amphitheater. 

  
Chastain Park (GNW #276).

Before going further with Monroe, we should look at a controversy involving the landscaper William Lott Monroe. 1941 (Jan. 25) Monroe’s Landscape & Nursery Co. is removed from Fulton County’s payroll: Drawn more than $17,000 from the county in the last year and one-half. 

 

The company was drawing $500 a month for supervising landscaping of county parks, which was in addition to flowers, shrubs and blueprints sold by it to the county. 

  
Beautiful chimney still around. 

(Nursery Company Is Cut Off Pay Roll.” Atlanta Constitution, Jan. 25, 1941) In 1941, Mr. Monroe was working on North Fulton Park, later known as Chastain Park. This park was annexed into the City of Atlanta on January 1, 1952.

  
Stone runoff. 

Monroe died in 1965, leaving his son, Billy, to run the business until its closing in 1985. 

  
Modern patio and star. 

William L. Monroe, Sr. Biographical Sketch

William L. Monroe, Sr. was born in 1892 in Biscoe, North Carolina, a crossroads community in the central part of the state. He graduated from Elon College in North Carolina and later studied at Duke and Cornell universities. He first came to Atlanta in 1917, when his military service brought him to Camp Gordon in Chamblee. He was working for the C.A. Dahl Company, a florist and nursery on Peachtree Street in Atlanta by 1920, the year he is first recorded in the Atlanta city directories. 

  
One of the earliest projects that can be attributed to Monroe is Dorough Garden on Lullwater Road, reportedly laid out in 1920. Internet images.

 

The garden incorporates formal and informal elements to create a lush setting for the Mediterranean-style house on the property. 

 

Not much is known of Monroe ’s work in the early 1920s through the early 1930s.

 
Well and bridges along Lullwater. 

According to his obituary in the Atlanta Journal, Monroe founded his own company, Monroe Landscaping & Nursery Company in 1925, although it does not appear in the city directories until 1932. The company was located on what is now his namesake road, Monroe Drive, near the Ansley Park neighborhood of Atlanta. 

  
Back to TRD images Monroe Gardens. 

Monroe owned a great deal of land in this area where there is now a large American Red Cross office. He lived in a house on the site. 

  
There was a second Monroe Chimney and Grill. 

There he had a garden that was used for parties, weddings, and other social activities. 

  

The garden featured extensive stone work. 

  
You can see why I am enamored with this Monroe Stonework. 
 
Until 1938 Monroe Drive was known as Boulevard Drive. The portion of Boulevard from Piedmont Road north was changed to Monroe Drive in honor of Monroe and his business. Copying information from several sources, gets repetitive. 

   
Running down the runoff.

Later, the name Monroe Drive was extended south to Ponce de Leon Avenue as it is today. Became Boulevard south of there. 

 
Modern bridge over to Bomb Shelter. 

Monroe’s business was apparently well established by the mid-1930s, and he was soon involved in a number of large-scale projects. 

  
Bomb Shelter. 

In 1937 Monroe began work on the landscaping for the home of Fulton County Commissioner Troy Chastain on Habersham Road in the Peachtree Heights subdivision in Buckhead. The steeply sloping rear yard of the house presented challenges in terms of controlling water run-off, but was perfectly suited to Monroe’s penchant for waterfalls and cascades. He constructed a meandering stream that travels through rock-lined channels, dropping into three pools as it descends. A rock walkway with short sections of steps ascends the hill, at one point crossing the stream with a large flat stone. To control run-off from the hill, Monroe constructed concrete channels that flow toward the side yard and around a hillside to a catch basin that carried the water to the street. There is another stream in the front yard that may have been fed by a spring. Monroe also constructed a large rock retaining wall with a stairwell cut into it to separate the driveway from the rear yard. Another interesting feature of the Chastain property is the two millstones that were used as paving stones at the front and rear entrances. Cut pieces of slate were arranged around the stones to create a sunburst effect. Monroe also used mahonia at the Chastain house, according to current owner John Foley. 

 
Home of John Foley 2875 Habersham Road. 

Monroe also served as a special consultant for Fulton County and assisted in development of several parks in Atlanta. Most notably, he (designed Adams Park and Chastain Park, which were championed by Commissioners Tony Chastain and Charles Adams. At Chastain, Monroe oversaw the construction of a number of stone features using WPA labor, including an amphitheater, retaining walls, grills, shelters, steps, and bridges. In November 1938, the Atlanta Journal reported that Chastain and a number of guests inspected the site of the park then under construction. Among the guests were William Monroe and Robert L. MacDougall and C.M. Johnson of the WPA.

  
Chastain Park (GNW #276)

In the late 1930s Monroe was hired to design and oversee construction of Carroll Gardens in DeKalb County, an extensive rock garden with pools and waterfalls overlooking a lake that was part of the Carroll family’s private recreational park. There are no known existing plans. The work was abandoned after being only partially completed. The garden was rediscovered under years of litter and overgrowth by a new property owner around 2000. The garden was restored and completed in the style and design typical of Monroe’s work.


TRD panoramic of lower pond. Glen Emerald Rock Gardens (Carroll Gardens) (GNW #160)

A curved stone bridge original to the garden is similar to the one in Adams Park. The rock garden, located in east Atlanta, is now part of the DeKalb County park system and known as the Glen Emerald Rock Garden.

 
Adams Park (GNW #277) 

Monroe is associated with other landscape projects in the Atlanta area, although not all of them are still in existence. The 1933 Garden History of Georgia notes two gardens planned by Monroe. The Selman garden is a mostly formal plan, but the garden known as Llwyn near the Brookhaven Country Club has more in common with his rock garden designs. Llwyn featured rising terraces that provided different perspectives from different parts of the house and grounds. A tea garden was furnished with tables and benches, as well as a stream that flowed down the hillside “over rocks and into pools”. Rock walls and weathered boulders were also placed around the garden. The plantings included ferns, perennials, and broad-leaved evergreens, as well as crocus, narcissi, pansies, tulips, and columbines. Also mentioned were azaleas, rhododendron, and mountain laurel, all of which were prominent in Monroe ’s designs. 

  
Back to Monroe Gardens.

Very few plans of Monroe have survived to the present to give an overall perspective on his work. Unfortunately, most of his plans were destroyed about the time that William Monroe, Jr. took over his father ’s business in the early 1950s. However, Monroe, Sr. continued to work at the firm until the early 1960s, and a few plans of the son’s collection at the Atlanta History Center were the work of the senior Monroe. These plans do provide some clues to Monroe’s style and influences. The earliest plan is dated 1940 and is for a Fulton County park in Alpharetta called Chastain Woods. No records exist to show the park was ever built. The design is interesting in that it features curvilinear paths reminiscent of Frederick Law Olmstead and his disciples. The topography is not shown, but presumably the paths follow the contours of the land. The paths are punctuated with small sets of stone steps to help navigate the slopes, and as found at his other parks and gardens, the trails lead to pavilions and picnic areas with fireplaces.

 
TRD continues to explore the Monroe Gardens.

   
Last images of Monroe Gardens. 

  
Monroe Stonework. Multiple weddings in here. 

   
Flowers all in the Ansley-Monroe Villas condominiums.

A later design of Monroe’s, dating to 1960, is an outdoor Sunday school classroom for the Druid Hills Methodist Church at the corner of Ponce de Leon and Briarcliff roads in Atlanta. A sketch of the site as planned shows typical elements of Monroe ’s naturalistic gardens. A curved stone wall with an attached bench defines the space, creating an irregular-shaped patio. The wall encircles a tree at one end of the patio and a stone table and seat are located at the other end, interrupting the flat plane of the surface. Plantings around the classroom space include a hedge of cherry laurel, beds of podocarpus, mahonia, azaleas, and blue lilyturf.

Some of the residential projects that were either designed or installed by William Monroe in the Buckhead area of Atlanta include the Hugh Nunnally estate on Blackland Road. Currently owned by owner of WEB MD.


Monroe did the stone and grass steps out front where Clark Gable and Carol Lombard posed for a photo during World Premier of Gone With the Wind in Atlanta. 

The Robert Woodruff House, 3rd owner of Coke.


Pine trees look like Augusta National. 

the Rufus DeWitt King estate, the Chester Martin estate on Blackland Road, 



and the Carlyle Fraser estate at 2 Vernon Road. 


Fraser was owner of Genuine Parts.

He also did the landscaping plans for the Moore’s Mill Reservoir and Secondary Pumping Station at the Atlanta Waterworks, 

 

the Biscayne Drive Apartments in 1955, 



a garden for Mr. and Mrs. Baxter Jones on Tuxedo Drive in northern Atlanta, and a proposed nursing home for the McDonough Construction Company in 1961. In 1959 he also rehabilitated the Cator Woodford Gardens on Ponce de Leon Avenue in Atlanta, which were originally designed by Robert B. Cridwell of Philadelphia in 1920. These plans were generally commercial in nature, and did not feature the stone walls, water features, and naturalistic settings like those found at Adams Park.

  

Fulton County (Part 7)

We continue with our National Register of Historic Places listings in Fulton County, Georgia. We have 91 left plus 6 former listings. 

North Avenue Presbyterian Church

 

 

 

  

Oakland Cemetery

  
Margaret Mitchell (Everybody drops a penny), Bobby Jones (Everybody drops a golf ball) , Kenny Rodgers (Everybody drops a poker chip).

 
Confederate Memorial and Sleeping Lion of Confederacy (removed). 

  
Maynard Jackson Monument. Mausoleums. Out in the Rain sculpture. 


We covered Oakland Cemetery extensively in (GNW # 268 Part 1) (GNW # 268 Part 2) (GNW # 268 Part 3)

Oakland City Historic District

Development of Oakland City as a suburb of Atlanta began with the completion of a trolley line to the area in the 1890s. The predominant architectural house type found throughout Oakland City is the bungalow. 

  
The Craftsman-style bungalow was the most popular early 20th-century house in Georgia.  

 
Oakland City Historic District is significant in the area of architecture for its good and intact collection of late-19th and early-20th century houses, commercial buildings, and community landmark buildings.

Odd Fellows Building and Auditorium

 
Soon to be homeless shelter 1800 men. 

 

 
Always wondered what this auditorium looked like. 

Omega Chapter of the Chi Phi Fraternity

 
A Georgia Tech Frat House?   

  
Boys in T for Tech.

 

J. K. Orr Shoe Company

Under architecture the building is significant as a good representative example of an early 20th-century factory designed by architect A. Francis Walker and constructed by the W. Bensel Construction Company. 

 

It is significant under industry as a shoe factory owned and operated by J.K. Orr, Sr. Orr employed between 200 - 400 people at his company where men's, women's, and children's shoes were manufactured. The shoe factory marketed its product primarily in the southeast but also exported its shoes to Cuba and South America.

   
Recently the building underwent extensive rehabilitation using federal investment tax credits and is now used as housing for the mentally ill.

Paces Ferry Tower

Paces Ferry Tower was built in the International Style and was briefly the tallest structure in Buckhead, according to the Georgia Trust. Its architect was James C. Wise, who built several Buckhead mansions, including the 1938 Meredith House at 417 Hillside Drive in the Chastain Park neighborhood, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Wise is also credited with a 1960s renovation of the Swan Coach House at the Atlanta History Center. 

 
The Tower is now Buckhead’s Kimpton Sylvan Hotel and is among the winners of a prestigious statewide historic preservation award.

 
The hotel, which opened last year, is a rehabilitation of the former Paces Ferry Tower. 

Palmer House and Phelan House Apartments

The Palmer House and Phelan House Apartments are two adjacent brick apartment buildings located on Peachtree Street and Peachtree Place (Ninth Street) in Atlanta's Midtown neighborhood. 

 

The Palmer House was Designed by Atlanta architect Gottfried L. Norrman, the Palmer House is an excellent example of the Queen Anne style.

 

The Phelan House apartments were completed in 1915 and designed by J. Neel Reid and Philip Trammel! Shutze, the Phelan, arranged in "flats," represents the precursor to garden apartments, which were popular in Atlanta in the 1920sand 1930s. 

  

Both architects studied in Europe before designing classically inspired residential and commercial buildings in Atlanta through the middle of the 20th century.

  

Park Street Methodist Episcopal Church, South

The Park Street Methodist Episcopal Church, South, is significant in architecture as a good example of a Gothic Revival- style church. 

 
Park Street Methodist Church meets National Register Criteria C because it is the work of a master, architect Charles Edward Choate, who worked all over the state of Georgia.  

  
He is noted for, and has been studied for, his churches, homes, and commercial buildings.

Peachtree Center Historic District

This Peachtree Center Historic District includes the Peachtree Center where we meet for my daily Bus Tour, and all the adjacent buildings mostly designed by Atlanta architect John C. Portman Jr.

 


From Weston Peachtree Plaza on left to Marriott Marquis on Right. 

  
Peachtree Center Courtyard. 

 

  
Known for Sky Bridges. One into Hyatt and an now abandoned one way high to top floor AmericasMart. 

Hyatt Regency Atlanta 1967

  

  

Westin Peachtree Plaza Hotel 1976

  
Hotel holds record most floors in Atlanta 70.  Damage after 2009 Tornado. Ground floor lobby.

Tallest hotel in the world upon completion in 1976. Today, it is the fourth-tallest hotel in the Western Hemisphere, and the 28th tallest all-hotel building in the world.
 
  
Sundial Restaurant rotates at top. The hotel was heavily featured in the 1981 film Sharky's Machine starring Burt Reynolds. Stuntman Dar Robinson, doubling for Henry Silva at the end of the film, dropped 220 feet from what appeared to be the Westin Peachtree Plaza, setting a record for the highest freefall jump from a building in a film. In actuality, however, the stunt scene was filmed at the nearby Hyatt Regency Hotel,using its shorter but similar cylindrical-shaped Radius Tower.

Atlanta Marriott Marquis 1985

  
Sleeping Lion of Lucerne Switzerland John Portman Sculptures. Like Jonah in belly of whale soft rib cage.
 
 

AmericasMart 1961, 1979, 1992, 2008

 

  

Truist Plaza 1992

  
Use to be Trust Company, then it was Sun Trust, now Truist. Ballet Olympia out front. 



American Cancer Society Center 1989

   
270 Peachtree Street, moved up hill from prior location down by Aquarium. White Oak Restaurant sells rabbit appetizer. 

Good spot for a 2nd TRD Scrolling Nugget, Rabbit at White Oak.



Peachtree Christian Church

The Peachtree Christian Church is significant in architecture as a fine example of a twentieth-century Gothic-styled church whose.sanctuary or nave is built on the historic Gothic floor plan and includes a vaulted ceiling, side aisles, arched window openings, ribs and bosses, all characteristic elements of this style.

 

The church is significant in art for its large collection of English stained glass made by William Glasby.

  



Peachtree Heights Park

The significance of Peachtree Heights Park is based on the exceptional quality of the residential architecture set within the landscape design of the notable architectural firm of Carrere and Hastings (who designed, among other buildings, the New York Public Library in New York City). 

  

The firm of Hentz, Reid and Adler (later Hentz, Reid, Adler and Shutze) designed at least fifteen houses in this district.

  

 

Peachtree Highlands Historic District  

Peachtree Highlands Historic District is historically significant in terms of community planning and development, architecture, and social history. 

  

In terms of community planning and development, it is significant in Atlanta as an example of a street-car/automobile suburb designed for the lower middle class. 

  
It provides an excellent contrast to Atlanta's many subdivisions of the same period designed for the upper middle and upper classes.

Peachtree Highlands-Peachtree Park Historic District

  

  

Peachtree Southern Railway Station

 

  
Southern Crescent to New Orleans, the Nancy Hanks to Florida. 

 

Edward C. Peters House

  
Also known as Ivy Hall.

  
Once was a restaurant called "The Mansion".

Piedmont Park




Georgia plays Auburn 1895.

 
(GNW #271)

 

Piedmont Park Apartments

 

 

  

Thomas H. Pitts House and Dairy

The Thomas H. Pitts Estate comprises a nearly complete early-twentieth-century dairy farm.

 

The Thomas H. Pitts Estate ("Casa Loma") is significant for its architectural qualities and landscaping, and historically significant for the role it played in dairying.

  

Pittsburgh Historic District

In 1883, the East Tennessee, Virginia, and Georgia Railroad Company (later Southern Railway Company) built a complex of railroad maintenance shops and a large rail yard southwest of downtown Atlanta, and a historic African-American neighborhood developed on the west side of the tracks along McDaniel Street.

  

Atlanta historian Franklin Garrett wrote that the name "Pittsburgh" was the result of the smoky rail yard's atmosphere being reminiscent of the steel mills of Pittsburgh, PA. 

 
Most of the residents were railroad workers, craftsmen, and domestic workers.

William G. Raoul House

The William G. Raoul House is one of the few remaining residences on Peachtree Street in Atlanta, a street once lined with grand late 19th and early 20th century houses. Most of these houses have been demolished as Atlanta's commercial center has grown north along the topographic ridge followed by Peachtree Street. These houses were among the finest works of residential architecture in the city at the time; most also were associated with Atlanta's most prominent families. The Raoul house is among a half-dozen surviving examples of these fashionable turn-of-the-century houses in Atlanta.

   

The Raoul estate buildings are the work of the noted architect Bradford Gilbert (1853-1911), who designed not only the building overall but also the interior decorative elements. 

   

At the time, Gilbert was one of the best-known architects of New York; he designed a number of early high-rise or sky-scraper buildings, of which the "Flatiron" building is one. He served as architectural consultant to several railroad companies, and he worked on an early remodeling of Grand Central Station. Gilbert also was the supervising architect for the Cotton States Exposition of 1895 in Atlanta.

Retail Credit Company Home Office Building

The significance of the Retail Credit Company Home Office Building is in architectural merit and in commercial history, as the first headquarters building for the Retail Credit Company, organized in March, 1899. 

  

Architecturally, it is significant as one of Atlanta's very few extant examples of Art Deco architecture. 

  

The building also is important because it was the first high-rise office building in Atlanta to be completely air-conditioned.

Reynoldstown Historic District

  

Reynoldstown is a community that was originally settled after the American Civil War by freed slaves who were employed by the railroad. Madison and Sarah Reynolds were among the first ex-slaves to move into the area, and it is believed that the neighborhood was named after them.

 

Rhodes Memorial Hall

  

  


I always heard this stain glass tells story of Civil War from secession to surrender.

Rhodes-Haverty Building

  

   

Isaac Roberts House

 

Up in Sandy Springs.

  

Rock Spring Presbyterian Church

 

Across Street from Fat Macs Rib Shack. 

  

Roscoe-Dunaway Gardens Historic District

Mostly in Coweta County, but part of the district is located in Fulton County. 

  
Seventy-nine buildings contribute to the historic district.

  
Place overgrown Kudzu until present owners went all out restoring it.

 
Original Lady spent eighteen years overseeing construction of a "theater-garden". She employed architects and a full-time stone mason for a decade.

 
This qualifies as a Natural Wonder down the road. 

Rufus M. Rose House

 
Abandoned now.

  
Use to be a museum and antique store.

   
Margaret Mitchell's rocking chair, Bobby Jones Calamity Jane putter, Eli Whitney's cotton gin, a Japanese zero bomber. 

F.H. Ross & Company Laundry Warehouse

The F.H. Ross & Company Laundry Warehouse, located at 833 Memorial Drive in Atlanta, is a historic building constructed in 1949. It became known as Atlanta Dairies in the 1960's. 

  

A notable example of the Streamline Moderne style, which is characterized by smooth, horizontal lines and often used for industrial/transportation related buildings.  

 

Streamline Moderne style was often applied to buildings with a transportation-related function or design, such as bus stations, drive-in restaurants, and gas stations, and limited extant examples in Atlanta include the Varsity restaurant (61 North Avenue NW, Jules Grey, 1940), the Atlanta Constitution Building (143 Alabama Street SW, Robert and Company, 1947), and Briarcliff Plaza (1027 Ponce de Leon Avenue NE and the 1061 Ponce de Leon Avenue, George Harwell Bond, 1940).

Roswell Historic District

  
Historic district including Roswell's town square, with 28 contributing buildings. 

 

We did three extensive post on Roswell Georgia GNW #144 (Part 1) - GNW #144 (Part 2) - GNW #144 (Part 3)



Simeon and Jane Rucker Log House

The Rucker Log House is a recently restored c.1833 log house with modern additions. It's significance is in terms of architecture for its log construction, its vernacular form and plan, and it's age. Less than a dozen log houses in Georgia are currently individually listed in the National Register, and none of these is in the metropolitan Atlanta area. 

 

It is also significant in terms of exploration and settlement for its direct historical associations with the first wave of Euro-American settlement in this part of the state. 

  
Dogs, ducks, Maine Cabin Masters. 

This region was opened to white settlement after 1832 when the State of Georgia with Federal assistance seized Cherokee Indian lands (by 1831) and distributed them to white settlers through a land lottery (1832).

  

St. Andrews Apartments

The St. Andrews Apartment building is located on the southeast corner of West Peachtree and llth Streets, in Atlanta, Fulton County, Georgia. It is a relatively simple seven-story, L-shaped, brick structure, built in 1924 and remodeled in 1958. 

   

The building is important in the area of social history for housing numerous middle and upper-class Atlantans in the 1920s and 1930s, some of whom were employed as physicians, nurses, stock brokers, company presidents, salesmen, lawyers, and real estate  developers. 

  
Many of the tenants were professionally associated with the builders and original owners of the building, the Wynne Claughton Realty Sales Corporation.

St. Mark Methodist Church

  

    

Sardis Methodist Church and Cemetery

Sardis Methodist Church and Cemetery (now known as Sardis United Methodist Church) is located on a relatively quiet five-acre site in the middle of a sprawling urban area of northern Atlanta known as Buckhead. With a congregation dating to c.1848, the 1927 church is at least the third religious building on the site. 

  

The interior is dominated by the sanctuary, which features classical details and several stained-glass windows dating to 1941. The 1927 church is a good example of the work of architect Owen James Trainor Southwell who designed the building with a rural aesthetic in the popular Colonial Revival style. 

  

The property is also significant at the local level under Criterion A in the area of exploration/settlement for the cemetery’s association with the early history of the Buckhead community. 

    

The first incarnation of Sardis Methodist Church on its current site likely dates to the late 1840s, around the same time that the nearby settlement of Irbyville came to be known as Buckhead.

Charles E. Sciple House

The Charles E. Sciple House is a two-story, brick, eclectic-style house with a one-story modern dining-hall addition on the southwest side and a northwest ell whose second-floor sleeping porch has been converted to an office. The brick exterior is embellished with very little ornamentation other than the shape of the house itself. 

  

The house is significant as the home of Charles E. Sciple (1857-1941), an Alabama native who took over an Atlanta building-supply business (known as Sciple and Sons).  

   
Presently, it is the home of the Women's Commerce Club.

Sears, Roebuck and Co. Mail-Order Warehouse and Retail Store

  
When it was being built, now it is Ponce City Market. 

   
Apartments upper levels.

Selig Company Building

 

   

Shrine of the Immaculate Conception

 

 

  

Archibald Smith House

 
Part of the trilogy of antebellum homes in Roswell.

   

Our GNW Gal for this post about Monroe Gardens can be no other than Marilyn Monroe herself. The original Playboy Playmate.